Road Trip Wrap Up

I know, I’m a little late on this post. I’ve been home for a little over a week so I figured it was time to share the latter half of my road trip!

Last known location was Washington, I had made it. The next few days did not go as planned because my good luck with good weather took a turn.

Packed my sister’s life into my car! Ready to hit the road.

My sister and I got a late start leaving Washington so we had to pass by Multnomah Falls. We were on our way to Crater Lake National Park. But wait! Avalanches in Crater Lake NP? Made the trip impossible for us unfortunately. While staying a night in Oregon, I stopped by Jeep service to check on a tire that had low tire pressure. Apparently a sharp rock had punctured the tread, so after a quick repair we were on our way again! We continued on down to Berkeley, CA to stay with one of my sisters friends for a couple days.

We arrived for dinner and the following day did a little hike in the hills before the rain started. That evening, we participated in the Women’s March in San Francisco (the day after Inauguration Day). It was a really incredible experience – completely peaceful and invigorating at the same time. The rain only dampened our clothes and some signs, but walking through downtown San Fran with over 100,000 others is not something I’m going to forget!

Women’s March in San Francisco

Our next stop was supposed to be Big Sur. But alas, land and mudslides closed the road. So scratch that. Let’s go to Yosemite! Oh wait, road closed due to snow. Ok.. how about Sequoia to the south… trees down so roads closed there!

Well, I guess we’re going around to Death Valley then! I’m really glad we did too – it was amazing. We had a little snow as we headed in and the valley itself was beautiful. My sister trapped a scorpion in the general store because the employees there were too afraid to capture it.

Sunrise after a snow in Lone Pine, CA as we started our drive into Death ValleyPass Overlook as we neared Death ValleyDeath Valley – there has been so much rain that there were areas in the basin that were actually floodedScorpion! The second I have seen on my travels this year

We went out the other side of Death Valley and were welcomed by a herd of Donkeys! We made a quick pit stop in Vegas to top of the fluids in my Jeep and continued on to Utah. We had an evening drive through a snow storm in Zion and stayed the night just outside of Bryce Canyon National Park.

Two of about 15 donkeys welcoming us to Nevada

Early the next morning we worked our way into Bryce to Sunrise Point. It was frigid and early, but totally worth it.

Bryce Canyon National Park sunriseBryce Canyon

From there we took the back roads up Boulder Pass and through Capitol Reef National Park. It was another stunning park!

Capitol Reef National Park

We finished up the day visiting both Canyonlands National Park and Arches National Park. We hiked out to Delicate Arch at Arches for sunset – it was spectacular.

Canyonlands National ParkSunset at Delicate ArchBalanced Rock at Arches National Park

The next two days were strictly road days. We spent 14+ hours each day in the car moving across the mid-west. We made a short stop to do a quick mile and a half hike on the second day because we were so tired of being in the car. When we made it to Virginia we spent the morning doing the upper section of the Blue Ridge Parkway. I think we passed one other car on the entire parkway!

I dropped my sister off in Maryland and made my way home to Maine that evening. All in all, an 8,850 mile road trip in 16 days. I wish I had more time to spend in Utah, and I wish we could have gotten to the closed parks, but there is always more time to visit in the future.